There's what you say and what you do
Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 2:51AM OPINION: "Stengthen (sic!) U.S.-China Trade Ties," by Chen Deming, Wall Street Journal, 27 April 2009.
BUSINESS DAY: "Where False Rings True: China Builds Phones On a Versatile Chip," by David Barboza, New York Times, 28 April 2009.
BUSINESS: "Intellectual property in China: Battle of ideas; Chinese companies are enforcing patents against foreign firms," The Economist, 25 April 2009.
The piece by the Chinese commerce minister is just fine, citing all sorts of smart cooperation in trade and finance--especially the call to restart Doha.
But the credibility suffers when there's no mention of intellectual property protection. America suffered (or prospered from) a long bout of such piracy, but then grew up. China will have to grow up much faster and it really is, in many ways, but the subject needs to be out there more from the Chinese, like in the realm of communications technologies (like the phone copying described above).
Already, Chinese companies are starting to seek such protections abroad and at home from foreign competition, so what's good for their geese must be good for our ganders. China's applications for patents are skyrocketing, so I expect this situation to resolve itself in relatively short--historically speaking--terms.
In short, the younger kids always grow up faster than the elder ones, and as far as this globalization is concerned, China is a lot younger.
Reader Comments (1)
Japan analyzed foreign technical developments for international growth potential. Then it required American and other nations' industries to define the manufacturing/development processes involved as well as the technical specs of products and services. While it took many years for Japan's government and analytic specialists to 'confirm' that the foreign products were 'safe' for Japanese use the Japanese counterparts began to produce domestic products that met government standards in a slightly different configuration to avoid piracy claims. Then Japan's industries used their public as quality assurance monitors to approve the rapidly evolving product and ready their industrial base for exports.
As time went by, Japan decided to partner with NIST and other institutions that laid the basis for shared globalization. In US, the auto companies, commercial aircraft companies, and IT folks were major players in this systematic process that could support rational outsourcing 'if' the domestic resources could be redirected to new needs and opportunities.
China had a more wild and crazy copy cat approach that served domestic needs with products that had less quality and global attractiveness ... until the last decade.
I have always been puzzled that US unions and stock market traders (not investors) could not see how Europe, America and Japan (now China too) partnerships fostered outsourcing ... and that it was necessary to adapt to the process rather than fight it for domestic politics.